From Castiel to Cass
by dakabn
Summary: A more subtle, organic approach to the Destiel ship. Working from first meeting on... and then I add fluff (chapter 5 on)... cuz I can
1. Chapter 1

Just a little fluff. People always start Destiel with a kiss. I'm gonna go with a dance. Ianto and Jack dancing came to mind, and I thought, yeah.

Because most fanfics are like "well, that escalated quickly" and even after a few seasons (I'm just on Season 6) Cas and Dean still have an interesting relationship, strained by duties. Duties they put on themselves, but still. Dean dealing with souless Sam and Castiel dealing with putting order to his home.

As far as I can tell, there is that profound bond, but while I count Sam mentioning Dean overcompensating and the "Last time someone looked at me like that, I got laid" comment from Dean when Cass was seething with loathing at him, I really don't see Dean admitting to anyone, especially himself, that he feels anything sexual for Cass.

(And I will spell it Cass. The captioning has it like that and Misha himself insists it's spelled that way and showing the script proving the spelling.)

In any case, I see where the writers have at least left it OPEN. They may or may not do a romance there, but there it is.

Also believing myself to be poly, I see no reason why they can't be together, even without sex, at least at first. I'm thinking a Shamy sort of situation.

So I'm going to work them into it slowly. Right now, where I am with the series, Cass was snarky about Dean selfishly insisting he work on Sam's issue... even in the mist of a civil war, however, later that same episode, Cass wistfully stated he'd rather be there on Earth.

Dean has used "friend" for Cass, so that's the state where I'll work up to this first bout of writing.


	2. Chapter 2

Dean was grateful. There was no doubting that. He had endured torture for, well, there was no point in keeping time. It was gonna be eternity. It took decades, he learned, before he broke. The pain lifted as he inflicted it. The relief brought joy. Even joy in inflicting it. Because as long as he inflicted it, he wasn't experiencing it. He never expected to be rescued. He resigned to the fact he'd become a demon. Realizing he'd simply die. If he ever made it back as a demon, Sam or some other hunter (or even another demon for whatever reason) would end him with the demon blade.

His only hope that it wouldn't be Sam using his demon-blood-powered brain powers. But as time went on with him being on the other end of the rack, he stopped caring. He even thought of ways to defeat Sam. How to trick Sam using his knowledge of his brother's weaknesses.

When he sucked in his first human breath in weeks/decades, depending how you looked at it, it was stale air. Useless. There was nothing. He clawed and dug his way out and once on the ground, sucking in actual good air, his mind settled to the new reality. It was very disorienting. There was a flash of light between the stale darkness and his laughing at the screams of his current victim. It was day and he still wasn't sure if it was his mind, Alastair playing with him, or what.

After a time, he gathered enough strength to find a road, follow it, and come upon an empty store. He didn't question where everyone was. It wasn't too late or too early to be open, and it was well stocked. He just went straight to the water. After he felt he wasn't going to disentigrate into a pile or dry flesh, he checked out the cash register.

It was wrong. He knew that deep down. But compared to what he just left, this was as petty as accidentally taking a pen from a waitress. Not that he and Sam were into making money the honest way, but no matter how you looked at it, this was a necessary evil. It might even be seen as the world paying them for saving people. Hazard pay. Maybe there was another way, but meh. Dad taught them and he taught Sam.

It's how it was.

Now after a bag full of water and the money and a bit of food, and hopping into a car he found parked outside, he made his way to Bobby's. That is after figuring out where he was. He had finally seen a street sign and made his way. With his route set awhile before any turn offs, his mind wandered. Why was he even buried? It was hunter tradition to be burned on a pyre. They knew too much about what might happen after you die to risk becoming a ghost. Or, most pressing, HOW was he back?

After convincing Sam and Bobby that it was, in fact, HIM, he grew resolute to find answers.

The answer came in the form of some dude in a trenchcoat that he couldn't seem to harm and could put people to sleep with the touch of two fingers. An angel. With wings... or what he could see as shadows of invisible wings. And hearing that he wasn't a special person that could behold Castiel's true form didn't bother him. He knew he was far from innocent and pure, assuming that's what the stranger had meant.


	3. Chapter 3

As time passed, he grew annoyed at the random appearances of Castiel, being all bossy and Dean being snarky. Even when Castiel pulled the "Don't make me turn this car around" speech, Dean was only momentarily shaken, because he was snarky as ever the next they met. Castiel seemed to accept this was just the man and nothing personal. Dean was angry, confused, and more or less pushed into a corner. He started to understand.

He started to REALLY understand. To the point he rebelled. Killing his very kindred. This human, who he was ordered to love as the rest, and save, and follow orders from at one point, was starting to make sense. It caused doubts and darkened the creature of light's perspective.

Sam looked different to Castiel. Dean had a purpose. Sam was something darker. Not only the demon blood that was force fed him when he was a baby, but the fact he intentionally partook, regardless of his motivation. Castiel could even understand the ultimate motivation, and rather didn't care if Sam lost himself, as he could easily end whatever Sam would have become. But he cared about Sam because Dean did.

Rather than kill Sam, he had to simply stop Sam from doing what he was doing. His words weren't needed. Dean didn't like the whole demon blood drinking thing already. But Castiel's threat, that was sobering.

It was then he realized, Castiel didn't have to even care. With a touch, he could put Sam down and then easily kill him. Likely also with just a touch. In all practicality, if Sam was a stranger, he'd kill him too. But that brother thing. Family.

Maybe it was unhealthy, but it was what it was. Castiel seemed to know it. Castiel knew that taking out Sam would make Dean useless. Dean was needing rescue BECAUSE he was trying to save Same. So in order to protect Dean, he had to protect Sam. Even if Sam was going to finish starting the end of the world.

Castiel might not be so bad. It was out of convenience, out of familiarity that the nickname slipped. Cass. Castiel had become part of his life enough to earn a nickname.


	4. Chapter 4

Castiel stared often at the man who had fierce love for his brother. He was learning. He couldn't relate, but tried to understand. All the others of his kind were his siblings. Of the billions of people on Earth, Sam and Dean were only each other's brothers. Without the other, their lives would be lonely. They seemed to need each other beyond what was normal, but it was necessary for Dean to have Sam. Castiel knew that.

So he dealt with the stress. It would have been so much easier to just end Sam. But Dean's unspoken insistence that his brother live seemed to radiate as bright as the sun itself. So instead of just Dean, it was also Sam that was under his charge.

It was the Winchesters that led him to rebel, to fight for humans rather than his own kind, but still against the demons. It was them he was reprimanded about and it was them who brought him out of his brokenness and back to the new resolution to help human kind, despite what his brothers had in mind for their world. Maybe Dean made Castiel rethink the whole genocide thing.

It wasn't until the disillusionment about his father had he decided to just give up. Alcohol. When he had first tried drinking with the ladies, he didn't get much out of it. So, he figured it would take more, like a whole liquor store's stock.

Somehow he had snapped out of it, they dealt with things, and somehow, triumphed. Not before Dean had almost given up. Dean was about to make all he's done, all he's sacrificed, all he's dealt with, nothing. Absolutely nothing. It pissed him off. It was worth beating the man's face to nothing more than a bruised apple.


End file.
